Spring is Just Around the Corner and Ratepayers get Hammered

Most Canadians from coast to coast look forward to Spring arrival as we get excited about warmer weather and watching mother nature show her stuff.  Those Canadians living in Ontario however can be both happy and sad about Spring arrival as it has the bad habit of generating increased costs for one of life’s necessities which is energy with an emphasis on the cost of electricity.

Two recent happenings on March 19, 2023, bring the focus on the sad part of Spring arrival.  The first is more sunshine which creates more energy from those solar panels which under the McGuinty led government received contacts at ridiculous guaranteed rates as high as 0.80/cents a kWh. Now apparently, they have embarked on more hits to our pocketbooks as the first six (6) hours of March 19^th suggests they can now produce power even when the sun isn’t shining as this screenshot from IESO demonstrates!

Solar Panel Generation When the Sun isn’t Shining?

As if the foregoing wasn’t enough weird news, on the same day as solar power was generated in darkness, we note IESO data supplied more bad news.  Normally at this time of year as the snow melts and water flows Ontario benefits from more generation from our hydro facilities which are also our cheapest and cleanest source of generation. As it turns out IESO data disclosed more bad news as the first three (3) hours of March 19^th (two days before spring arrives ) those IWT (industrial wind turbines) generated more electricity than our hydro plants as evidenced in the following two screenshots.

Wind Generation Beats Hydro Generation!

To accentuate the foregoing those IWT did the same thing in the last three hours of the day as the following screenshots clearly show!

IWT Generation Hours 22, 23, 24!

Hydro Generation Hours 22, 23, 24!

Over the full 24 hours IWT generated a total of 92,447 MW or approximately 78.6% of their capacity and only slightly less than hydro which generated 94,511 MW but could have easily produced more.  Ontario was busy selling off the unneeded power which we (logically) should attribute to IWT generation to our neighbours at an average price of $14.86/MWh. We exported 53,308 MW so generated revenue of around $792K while we paid $135/MWh for it, so it cost Ontarians about $6.4 million for unneeded power.  We should also suspect IESO were busy telling OPG to spill hydro (we are obliged to also pay for) as demand was low and only peaked at 17,057 MW at hour 20.

The ups and downs of those intermittent IWT and solar panels are in the bad habit of generating lots of unneeded power during the spring and fall seasons when Ontario demand is low. They are the principal reason the Province of Ontario stiff taxpayers with annual additional costs of $6.5 billion in an attempt to hide the mess our electricity system is actually in.

Just one day’s data makes it obvious both of the foregoing sources of intermittent and unreliable electricity generation should be tossed in the garbage!

Unreliable Industrial Wind Turbines Barely Evident on March 2, 2023

Just two days ago, on March 1, 2021 at Hour 22 (hour ending at 10 PM) Bruce Nuclear’s Unit G-3 with a capacity of 784 MW was shut down for major component replacements (MCR) and will not return to service until sometime in 2026.  Daily that unit has been supplying enough generation for 12% (627,000) of Ontario households with (18,800 MWh) their electricity needs. The refurbishment of that unit brought down Ontario’s nuclear baseload to just under 8,000 MW so coupled with all of Ontario’s run of river hydro it is insufficient to meet our peak needs and we can’t count on Quebec to always be there to cover our shortfalls.  The Society of United Professionals pointed out why we can’t count on Quebec to help us out in a February 2021 report in which they stated: “importing firm baseload power from Quebec is not as simple as signing a contract and flipping a switch. As a result of bottlenecks in Ontario’s transmission system, pressures on Quebec’s power supply and Ontario’s ongoing reliance on Quebec for summer peak power, there are multiple reasons that imports are not the simple solution they may seem.“

Likewise, even though Ontario has grid connected IWT (industrial wind turbines) with a reported connected capacity of about 4,900 MW (6 times the G-3 unit) their average annual generation is only in the 29/30% range. Further because of their intermittency they cannot be counted on to generate power when it is actually needed. March 2^nd is a perfect example as over the full day they only generated 11.6% (13,619 MW) of their capacity with a peak at Hour 18 of 957 MW (19.5% of capacity) and a low of 275 MW (5.6% of capacity) at Hour 1.

Fortunately, yesterday was a relatively speaking; a mild winter day in Ontario and Quebec and peak demand came at hour 20 when it reached its high for the day at 18,579 MW and those IWT contributed only 2.6% (486 MW) of demand at that hour. Because it was a somewhat mild winter day Hydro Quebec was able to supply around 38,000 MWh while we were busy selling about 24,000 MWh to Michigan. Had it been a cold winter day Quebec would have needed the power they supplied Ontario via our intertie connections. As it turned out we were a net importer of power for twenty-two hours and a net exporter for only two hours of the day which is a big turnaround from when our nuclear baseload was higher in the 10,000 MW range only a month or so ago.

What really stepped up to the plate for Ontario yesterday was our natural gas generation thanks to its flexibility and over the 24 hours it supplied us with 68,552 MWh or about what 2.3 million average Ontario households (45% of Ontario households) consume daily.  At our peak hour it provided 3,957 MWh or 21.3% of demand and over eight times what those IWT generated. It should also be noted the abilities of natural gas generation to be so flexible presumably resulted in the HOEP (hourly Ontario energy price) remaining relatively stable throughout the day in the $30/MWh range.

The good news is Bruce Nuclear’s Unit 6, the first unit to be refurbished under the MCR project, is scheduled to return to service later in 2023 and its life cycle will be extended to the early 2060s! Perhaps by then politicians will have abandoned the concept of wind and solar being a reliable supply of electricity and the eco-warriors will have returned to their caves!

Investigative Reporting by a Toronto Star Journalist is Disinformation

Recently invited to be a guest on Zoomer Radio, I agreed, and was informed I would be joined by Bryan Purcell, VP of Policy and Programs at The Atmospheric Fund. TAF is a “not-for-profit” company with almost $100 million of “restricted funds” that have been provided by the City of Toronto, the Province of Ontario and the Government of Canada and appears to have 30 employees.  They use the revenue generated from the funds ($7.1 million in their 2020 and $1.2 million in 2021 financial reports) and other revenue (minimal) to provide grants described as: “has the potential to generate large-scale carbon reduction in the GTHA“ (Greater Toronto Hamilton Area).

The planned discussion/debate was to be in respect to a Toronto Star article posted November 30, 2022 titled “Ontario’s new gas plants will cause your hydro rates to rise, report says” and presumably for Zoomer’s audience to hear competing views on the content in the article from yours truly.

Shortly before the program was to start the Auditor General of Ontario released her annual report so I, and presumably Bryan Purcell, were informed the discussion was cancelled as the host wanted to cover the AG report due to it’s significance in detailing how the AG viewed Premier Ford’s led financial management over the prior year.

The TorStar article was written by Marco Chown Oved* who identified himself as a “Climate Change Reporter” in the article heading! On his LinkedIn profile, he identifies himself as an “Investigative Reporter at Toronto Star”! The TAF representative, Bryan Purcell, also scheduled to be on the radio program, is quoted in the article and on his LinkedIn profile states he is a: “Environmental Professional focused on Climate Change mitigation“ but his qualifications suggest he is stretching the truth.

Below we will examine some of the claims made in the article based on the report prepared by Power Advisory, which we assume TAF paid for with our tax dollars!  The report’s author from Power Advisory was Travis Lusney, whose LinkedIn profile discloses he was the Senior Business Analyst at the OPA (Ontario Power Authority). In that former position he states he; “Managed analysis and implementation of procurement policy. Focused on the Feed-In Tariff Program with emphasis on pricing, connections and stakeholder engagement.“  Hmm, one should wonder if Mr. Lusney, was at least partially responsible for the cost of electricity in Ontario jumping by over 100% due to the FIT contracts to wind and solar proponents which paid them as much as 82 cents/kWh for rooftop solar. Perhaps we should take his recent report to TAF with the proverbial “grain of salt”, or should we simply shrug it off based on the “investigative journalism” claims of Marco Chown Oved, the Toronto Star reporter?

Claims from the article:

“Rather than relying on natural-gas-fired generation to meet growing electricity demand, Ontario’s cheapest and most reliable options require new wind and solar,”

It is unbelievable the “investigative journalist” didn’t bother to do a little research work on the foregoing claim as he would quickly discover wind and solar are not the “cheapest and most reliable”. Had the author simply bothered to look at the February 2022 report of the FAO (Finance Accountability Office of Ontario) he would have discovered they have driven up the cost of electricity to the point where taxpayers are forced to absorb a cost of “$38.6 billion (32.7 per cent) to move most of the cost of 33,000 renewable energy contracts with wind, solar and bioenergy generators from all electricity ratepayers to the Province.“  Had he also bothered to just examine a few days of IESO data he may also have discerned wind and solar’s bad habits of generating power when it’s unneeded and failing to deliver power during “peak hours” on cold winter days and hot summer ones. Recent examples of unneeded power generation occurred December 2^nd and 3^rd when IWT (industrial wind turbines) operated at 76% of their rated capacity whereas on December 7^th and 8^th they operated at a miserly 8.5% of their rated capacity. In the first instance the IESO were forced to sell off that power for pennies of it’s cost and in the latter case natural gas and hydro ramped up to prevent blackouts such as those that occur in California and elsewhere around the world where wind and solar are a large part of electricity grids.

People, governments and businesses are switching en masse to electricity as a power source for cars, heating and heavy industry in an effort to lower carbon emissions and avoid the worst effects of climate change.

Once again, the Toronto Star’s “investigative reporter” obviously did not do any research, or he would have discovered the “en masse” switch is not happening to any great extent without government grants, and they obviously must be higher or people won’t switch.  In the case of EV penetration a very recent article from mid November pointed out EV sales in Canada were low during the first 6 months of 2022 stating:  “Based on average new vehicle registrations, the EV total would have to grow from 55,600 to about 480,000 over six months to hit that 60 per cent target.” The 60 per cent target is for 2030 and the 2035 target is 100 per cent. The Federal government also hand out grants for heat pump conversions as well as interest-free loans of $40K but once again reviewing government statistics the conversion rate is not happening. A StatCan report notes heat pumps as a primary heat source have only grown from 3% in 2013 to 5% in 2019 and forced air furnaces have only declined by 1% from 53% in 2013 to 52% in 2019. Funnily enough, electric baseboard heaters over the same time frame fell from 28% to 26%. The actual data easily demonstrates the “en masse” switch the author suggests is a fallacy!

“The report says Ontario needs to start making significant investments in its grid, especially considering the lengthy timelines required to build the transmission, generation and storage required to simultaneously meet demand and reduce emissions.”

Hydro One just received approval from the OEB (Ontario Energy Board) for a rate increase for planned capital spending on their transmission system.  The spending appears to represent about $7.5 billion over the next five years.  Spending of that amounts suggests the investment is “significant” and a little research by the article’s author would have disclosed that!  No investigative integrity is apparent!  

“It’s very clear that if we’re going to go to net-zero, renewables are going to be part of the mix,” said Travis Lusney, the report’s author and director of power systems at Power Advisory. “How far you go is dependent on a lot of factors, even outside of the electricity sector.”

Well, it is apparent Lusney has a love affair with renewables as his prior role at the OPA (Ontario Power Authority), created by the McGuinty Government handed him the power to construct the mess of the electricity sector in Ontario that (as noted above) the FAO stated in his February 2022 report will cost taxpayers $38.6 billion.

“The report finds that a 97 per cent non-emitting grid can be achieved by building new transmission lines, solar and wind generation as well as energy storage facilities. This would allow the grid to reduce its dependence on natural gas to a few peak demand days in mid summer.”

It is worth noting the report fails to mention Ontario’s electricity grid is already over 92% “non-emitting” and fails to include a cost/benefit analysis to achieve the additional 5% emissions reduction it seeks. The report in the three scenario’s recommends adding as much as 12,700 MW of wind capacity, 5,500 MW of solar capacity and 3,900 MW of storage capacity. The report goes on to suggest those wind turbines, solar panels and the storage capacity be spread throughout the province. The report then forecasts due to the spreading it would require as much as an $8.4 billion spend on the transmission system in order to get the power to where its needed. In summary the Power Advisory report recommends  spending billions of dollars to achieve a 5% reduction in emissions in Ontario’s electricity system.  As outlined above it is very unlikely those new facilities coupled with the additional wind, solar and storage capacity and their associated costs would reduce electricity prices! Instead those costs would drive up prices much as they did in the past with a much smaller capacity addition of renewables. Nevertheless, we should be pretty sure Power Advisory would love the foregoing to happen and Travis Lusney would surely rise in the ranks of his employer, Boston Advisory, who would stand to benefit from the money stream generated by assisting applicants seeking contracts from IESO. 

“In each scenario, hydro prices will be lower than they would be if the province goes through with its plan to build new gas plants, the report concludes, mostly because gas is expected to get more expensive, a rise that will be exacerbated by the increase in carbon tax. Meanwhile, prices for wind and solar, which are already cheaper than natural gas, are expected to fall.”

First off, one should wonder how each scenario will cause “hydro prices” to be lower but perhaps they were actually suggesting “electricity prices” will be lower? Past and current experience in Ontario due to wind and solar generation have actually caused “hydro spills” meaning OPG are paid to simply spill water over dams without running them through the turbines. Ratepayers, however pick up the costs of those spills and for the past several years their costs have been substantial. The spills by OPG are almost always caused by unneeded wind generation as their contracts give them “first-to-the-grid” rights . On the statement, “prices for wind and solar” are expected to fall” is also far from the truth.  As one example an article last month about Vestas, the world’s largest wind turbine manufacturer, stated: “Vestas has raised prices more than 30% in the past year to help stem losses.“  It should also be recognized gas prices would fall if our abundant supplies in Saskatchewan and Alberta had more pipelines available but the Federal government has done everything in its power to prevent that from happening.

As the foregoing once again suggests; the Toronto Star, their reporters, and other MSM companies simply accept what they are told or read and fail to do any research to determine if they are providing facts or fiction. In this case it seems obvious it is the latter and reporter Marco Chown Oved should immediately rewrite his LinkedIn memes as it doesn’t suggest he is a “investigative reporter”!

* Marco Chown Oved’s LinkedIn biography brags about how the CAJ (Canadian Association of Journalists) were so enthralled with an article he wrote about “climate change” they blessed him for writing it. Perhaps they will do so again for this diatribe of BS as the MSM seems to have abandoned publishing the truth and the CAJ has endorsed their abandonment!  This is what Marco Chown Oved has on his LinkedIn site: ”Awarded the inaugural Environmental and Climate Change Award from the CAJ for my feature on heat waves in Montreal, a part of the Toronto Star’s Undeniable series on climate change.”

Michigan, New York and Quebec Ratepayers Should Thank Ontario Ratepayers and Taxpayers for their Early Christmas Present

As frequently happens during the Spring and Fall those IWT (industrial wind turbines) were spinning, decimating migrating birds and bats, and causing Ontario’s households and businesses to dig into their pockets to pay for their intermittent and unreliable power over the past few days. 

Looking at IESO (Independent Electricity System Operator) Data for December 2^nd and 3^rd one should be shocked at how much power those IWT generated and why it wasn’t needed.  If one also includes the 2,000 MW, they curtailed, they operated at about 76%* of their capacity burdening the ratepayers and taxpayers of the province.  In total 176,330 MWh were grid accepted by IESO and 55% of that was exported to our neighbours in Michigan, New York, and Quebec over those two days.

To put the IWT generation in perspective their grid accepted generation was approximately what 2.9 million Ontario households (56% of all households) would consume over two days!

If one reviews the electricity sectors of Michigan and New York, you note, for both states; carbon emissions from their electricity generation greatly exceed those of Ontario. That being the case, why are Ontario’s ratepayers burdened with absorbing the costs of those IWT producing unneeded power for export.  Handing New York and Michigan our clean power for pennies of their costs is an expense passed on to all residential households and businesses in Ontario, yet New York and Michigan reap the benefits!

In the case of Quebec their electricity system is relatively emissions free, but they export much of their clean hydro power to New England states under lucrative long-term contracts! Oddly enough Hydro Quebec ask their residential customers to reduce their electricity usage during winter months because 60% of their households heat their homes with electricity. Because Hydro Quebec are committed to supply power to US states under the contract terms they ask their households to use less.

Using less in Ontario when those IWT are spinning works to the benefit of our neighbours and simply raises the costs for Ontarians.  Strange outcomes: but seemingly we are told we must endure the costly pain reputedly (?) due to the contracts the McGuinty/Wynne led government(s) blessed under the Green Energy and Green Economy Act (GEA).

The market price or HOEP (hourly Ontario energy price) for December 2^nd averaged only $29.73/MWh (3.0 cents/kWh) over 24 hours and for December 3^rd over 24 hours averaged $26.04/MWh (2.6 cents/kWh), yet Ontario ratepayers were burdened with the contracted “first-to-the-grid” payments embedded in those long-term contracts. Those 176,330 MWh plus the 2,000 MWh curtailed collectively cost Ontarians about $23.8 million over the two days before accounting for what we were paid by Michigan, New York, and Quebec for their purchases.

The exported power of 96,989 MWh (net of cost recoveries from the HOEP sale price) came to $10.559 million. The latter represented a cost for each household of over $2.00 for just those two days. 

The cost of the exported power coupled with the IESO grid accepted 79,441 MWh and the 2,000 MWh of curtailed generation, adds an additional $10.960 million ratepayer cost to what IWT owners received for those two days.  What that reflects is the total cost to Ontario ratepayers/taxpayers for the two days of IWT generation was $21.279 million or $266.60 per MWh (26.6 cents/kWh) and a multiple of all other generation sources costs with the exception of solar power.

The time to stop the continued bleeding of Ontario ratepayers should be recognized by the Ford government and regulations enacted by them to end the largesse being passed on to those IWT owners!

*IWT in Ontario and elsewhere consistently operate at an average of 29/30% of capacity annually but fall far short of that average on a consistent basis during Ontario’s peak demand days on the hot summer and cold winter days

Ontario’s Perfect Demonstration of Wind’s Intermittent and Unreliable Nature

A Short History about wind’s electricity generation arrival

“Scottish engineer and physicist James Blyth (1839-1906) was credited as the first to generate electricity by constructing a windmill attached to a dynamo to light his cottage in his home village of Marykirk, Scotland in 1887.  He offered to allow his current to be used to light the main street of the village, but superstitious residents reportedly considered the mysterious electric light to be “the work of the devil“!

The Ups and Downs of Industrial Wind Generation

 A day in the life of industrial wind turbines in Ontario

On November 11^th Ontarians were treated to the up and down vagaries of IWT (industrial wind turbines) spread throughout the province. They did a great job exhibiting their spasms and inability to generate power when needed but cranked it out when unneeded. A few examples over the day follow!

Hour 1

At Hour 1, IESO forecast IWT would generate 3,936 MW but only accepted 3,253 MWh on the grid so we should assume the difference (683 MW) was curtailed at a cost of $120/MWh allocated to ratepayers.  The market price (HOEP) was 0.00/MWh over the hour as we supplied Michigan, New York, and Quebec with 2,428 MWh. The 2,428 MWh represented 74.6% of the above noted grid accepted IWT generation so clearly wasn’t needed but, we ratepayers picked up their costs of over $327,000.  To drive the point home IWT frequently generate power when its unneeded! Ontario’s peak demand in Hour 1 was only 12,591 MW and could have been easily supplied by nuclear and hydro alone but the “first-to -the-grid rights allotted to IWT companies usurps our other generation sources! Hydro at that hour generated only 3,307 MWh, their lowest hourly generation for the day!

Hour 4

Moving on to Hour 4 (hour ending at 4 AM) IESO reported it as the lowest Ontario peak demand hour (12,095 MW) for the day and those IWT were still humming and forecast to generate 2,938 MW. IESO accepted 2,718 MW (22.5% of demand) and sold off 2,497 MW (91.9% of accepted IWT generation) to the same Hour 1 buyers for the princely sum of $3.49/MWh generating $8,714.53 of revenue but it cost (assuming it was all IWT generation) us Ontarians $337,095.00 without including curtailed costs.

Hours 1 to 7

Hours 1 to 7 saw IESO forecast IWT generation of 19,866 MW (58% of their capacity) and 17,884 MW was accepted while exporting 16,422 MW (91.8% of IWT grid accepted generation). The HOEP average was $8.90/MWh for those 7 hours meaning if those exports were either all IWT generated power (very likely) or caused by them the net cost to Ontario ratepayers was: $1,963,000 (16,422 MW X $135 plus 1,982 MW [curtailed] X $120 minus 16,422 MW X $8.90) for those 7 hours!

Hours 8 to 19

As the day progressed Ontario peak hourly demand increased while generation from IWT fell and at Hour 18 they only supplied 267 MW or 1.5% of Ontario’s daily peak demand of 17,237 MW! IWT failure at that hour to provide generation meant “net imports” were 1,004 MW as we purchased power from Quebec and even some from Michigan.  We paid an average of $46.93/MWh for that imported power greatly exceeding the cost of our sales to them in the middle of the night when those IWT were generating power we didn’t need.  As IWT generation fell the HOEP market price climbed and from hours 8 to 19 averaged $50.12/MWh a vast improvement from the early morning prices.

Hour 17 and hours 20 to 24

IWT generation at Hour 17 was at its lowest for the day generating only 240 MW but it started to ramp up slowly and by hour 20 was generating five times what it generated at hour 17.  For hours 20 to 24 IESO accepted 10,357 MW as peak demand fell and exports climbed.  Needless to say, as demand fell over the final five hours IWT generation increased while the HOEP fell from $34.40/MWh during Hour 20 to $2.11/MWh in Hour 24 as our unneeded generation from those IWT climbed!

The “first-to-the-grid” rights granted to the IWT owners by the Ontario McGuinty/Wynne led government(s) continue to burden us ratepayers with costs as the foregoing clearly demonstrates! As it turned out November 11^th, 2022, captured the intermittency and unreliable nature of IWT over a 24 hour period clearly demonstrating how they operate not just daily but, weekly, monthly and annually! 

Based on what Ontarians and many others around the world are currently experiencing, due to the unreliable and intermittent nature of those “windmills”, we should, perhaps reconsider the events from 135 years ago! Eco-warriors around the world have pushed to have IWT replace reliable electricity generation from fossil fuels in their push for “net-zero” so perhaps the label by the residents of Marykirk, Scotland in 1887 should be resurrected and applied to IWT but not the electric light.

Perhaps it really is the “work of the devil” posing as an eco-warrior out to save the world from “climate change” that brought on the push for those intermittent and unreliable IWT! 

Wind Generated Electricity’s Big Fall Discount for Our Neighbours

Yesterday, October 2nd, 2022, once again, demonstrated how IWT (industrial wind turbines) generate wasted costs for Ontario ratepayers and taxpayers. Their “first-to-the-grid” rights is akin to us simply going outside and throwing our after-tax dollars into the wind! The contracts IWT owners have continues to drive up our energy costs due to their propensity to deliver unneeded power more frequently than they deliver “needed” generation! Reliable Power is not something we should expect from IWT as is again evidenced by how they perform!

During the first 16 hours yesterday the IWT were humming and produced 32,400 MW and also had another 8,300 MW curtailed which collectively was about 52% of their capacity. Combined those IWT owners will see $5.470 million delivered to their bank accounts for those 16 hours as they are paid $135/MWh for grid accepted generation and $120/MWh for curtailed generation. 

During those same 16 hours none of the wind generation was needed as when demand peaked over those hours at Hour 16 it was only 13,296 MW and the daily peak at Hour 20 only reached 15,320 MW!

The unneeded 32,400 MW those IWT generated in the first 16 hours, along with the curtailed power, drove down the market price or HOEP (hourly Ontario electricity price) to an average of $1.57/MWh.

The low price was loved by our neighbours in New York, Michigan and Quebec as they snapped up 38,743 MW generating a miserly $60.8 thousand for what cost us Ontario ratepayers/taxpayers north of $5.4 million just for the IWT generated power.

We Ontarians were also dinged for the remaining 8 hours but the HOEP was at least higher averaging $39.57/MWh meaning it didn’t cost us the $166.94/MWh we had to absorb for the first 16 hours of the day selling off the IWT generation. During those 8 hours wind delivered another 10,223 MW (26% of capacity) so we were forced to absorb another $404K.

We should continue to wonder; why doesn’t the Ford led Ontario Conservative Party end the madness (stupidity) of those IWT contracts by passing legislation eliminating their “first-to-the-grid” rights?

Once Again Ontario Ratepayer Dollars, are Blowing in the Wind

September 26^th was another day where Ontario’s ratepayers and taxpayers were burdened with paying lots of our after-tax dollars to IWT (industrial wind turbines) owners for energy surplus to our demand!

The approximately 4,900 MW of IWT cranked out 64,726 MW (55% of their capacity) and received the contracted price of $135/MWh. Additionally, it appears IESO also had them curtail 6,100 MW (5.2% of capacity) for which they received $120/MWh.  In total the cash they will be paid is about $9,470,000 ($8,738,000 for grid accepted generation plus $732,000 for curtailed generation).

The annoying part of the foregoing costs to us Ontarians is, we didn’t need the IWT generation as so frequently happens during the Spring and Fall seasons when demand is low.  The peak demand yesterday occurred at Hour 17 (hour ending at 5 PM) which was 15,657 MW versus the 20,000 MW plus peak demands we frequently see during warm summer days. The latter is when those IWT often generate a miserly 5 to 10% of their capacity.

As it turned out IESO was busy yesterday selling our excess generation to our neighbours in Michigan, New York and Quebec who gobbled up 61,181 MW (94.5% of IWT generation) of the unneeded surplus. What normally happens when those IWT are generating those unneeded megawatts is the market price is always low. Yesterday was no exception as IESO sold off the foregoing for the average HOEP (hourly Ontario export price) market price of $13.36/MWh so it produced revenue of only $817,000 meaning it barely paid for the cost of just the curtailed generation!

Those “first-to-the-grid” rights the McGuinty/Wynne led Ontario Liberal Party gave to the IWT owners via the FIT (feed-in-tariff) contracts continues to harm us and impacts the costs of electricity in the province eating up family and business money during these inflationary times.

Just more “money for nothing” from us compliant ratepayers/taxpayers doing nothing to reduce emissions while picking our pockets!

IESO Creates and Promotes Hybrid Electricity Generation-What could go wrong?

Who knew?

IESO recently claimed by simply combining very old technology mankind would create hybrid electricity generation! 

The foregoing was stated recently by IESO in their September report “Enabling Foundational Hybrid Facility Models in the IESO-Administered Markets ”.  One example cited by IESO in the 46 page report, says combining batteries (invented in 1800 by Italian physicist Alessandro Volta) with electricity generated by wind turbines (created by Professor James Blyth in 1887) is “hybrid” generation.  The following from the report states: “Expiring wind and solar contracts along with declining technology costs for battery storage is expected to drive hybrid facility development over the next decade.”

It appears to be similar to mating horses and donkeys to create mules.  Considering how long batteries and wind generated electricity have been around perhaps IESO should name this new “hybrid” they claim now exists in Ontario?  The words “double-dealing” and or “chicanery” added to wind/battery or solar/battery would be a good descriptive for these hybrids!   

The foregoing implies IWT (industrial wind turbines) and solar with FIT (feed in tariff) contacts brought to us in Ontario by the McGuinty/Wynne governments will be renewed as long as battery storage is added by the owners. One should wonder if the Ontario Minister of Energy, Todd Smith has been played by Mark Carney, Vice Chair of Brookfield? A Brookfield subsidiary recently proposed a $300 million 161 MW (megawatts) battery storage unit that will reputedly contain four hours (644 MWh) of dispatchable energy and those batteries will be charged in the middle of the night and dispatched during the day when demand is high.  The benefit to Brookfield will translate to selling the power when the HOEP (hourly Ontario energy prices) market price is high while downloading it when prices are low. 

What looks to be somewhat confusing about this “hybrid” issue is the Energy Minister’s letter of August 23, 2022 wherein he states:  “I am pleased to see that through the first Medium-Term RFP (MT1 RFP) our government’s approach of competitive procurements has secured supply at a cost about 30 per cent lower than previous contracts.” It one believes he was referencing IWT contracts which are paid $135/MWh that would reduce the price for grid accepted wind to $94.50/MWh without including what we are also paying for “curtailed” generation of $120/MWh! 

Interestingly enough it appears the “30 per cent lower” quote from the Ministry letter is related to comments in the 46 page September 2022 report from IESO titled:  “Enabling Foundational Hybrid Facility Models in the IESO-Administered Markets”! The IESO report has the following two sentences: “Post-market renewal, there will be a locational marginal price (LMP) for the storage injecting resource and another LMP for the storage withdrawing resource. The LMP values may be different for the two (2) resources (e.g., $20/MW for the storage withdrawing resource and $21/MW for the storage injecting resource).”

The question becomes; had IESO negotiated the additional payment(s) with the IWT owners and made the Minister aware of the agreement reached before he penned his letter as it infers; due to the date of his letter proceeding the IESO report by one month?

Despite the foregoing question it seems interesting that the two additional payments added to the 30% reduction would bring the total cost of wind generation to $135.50 ($94.50+$20.00+21.00=$135.50).  The other question is whether the IWT owners can pick and choose when to sell their stored energy and if they will be allowed to choose hours when the HOEP market price is higher than the guaranteed price?

Another very recent announcement from Capital Power in Windsor suggests Ontario’s natural gas fired plants are keen to get in on the “battery” storage action as the September 21, 2022 article in the CBC suggests.  Capital Power is proposing to add a 40 MW battery storage unit particularly as IESO has forecast “demand in southwestern Ontario as a whole is expected to double over five years to about 2,000 megawatts”.  The article highlights a report from Power Advisory which amusingly recommends the City of Windsor ironically investigate “importing power from Michigan” whom the EIA (US Energy Information System) note in 2021 got their largest share (32%) of electricity from coal generation.

One of the principal reasons for the IESO projected demand increase is; “the announcement of the $4.9-billion Stellantis-LG Energy Solution electric vehicle battery plant, a massive facility slated to open in 2024.” The press releases from the Provincial and the Federal Governments don’t disclose how much taxpayers will be providing as the Federal Press Release notes: “Details of this agreement are subject to commercial confidentiality and cannot be disclosed at this time”.  Needless to say we taxpayers should expect government grants will be several hundred million of our tax dollars! Both press releases tout the wonders of converting from manufacturing ICE to EV automobiles in line with PM Trudeau and his minions seeking to achieve his target of “100% zero-emission vehicle (ZEV) sales by 2035”. The only announcement about grants was from the City of Windsor who have committed $68 million with the help of a $45 million loan from Infrastructure Ontario an Ontario taxpayer owned entity.

As IESO and the Federal, Provincial and Municipal governments here in Canada continue the push for batteries to be manufactured in Ontario and to also provide electricity it is interesting to note California has similar targets as those proposed by our various government bodies. Very recently PG&E (Pacific Gas & Electric) experienced yet another major battery fire at a large battery storage unit (182.5 MW) and that plant has now been shut down indefinitely!  

From the above summary of ongoing events here in Ontario and elsewhere it seems, in the minds of our bureaucrats and politicians charged with running our energy system (whose objectives should be reliable power), their view is:

“everything old is new again”!

Perhaps Voters Should Demand IQ Tests for Anyone Running for Public Office

Numerous events recently have caused yours truly, and hopefully many more, to wonder; are we are being led by elected politicians, federally, provincially and municipally with IQs (intelligent quotients) that would easily qualify them for a place in the “Dumb & Dumber” cast of the movie of the same name!  Those politicians take it upon themselves to direct bureaucrats; responsible for managing public services (entities paid with our tax dollars), to do what they are told. The bureaucrats do as they are told as they are well paid with lots of perks so they don’t “pushback” no matter the stupidity of the directives!

Let’s have a look at a few issues related to mankind’s need for “energy” firmly under control of politicians. Energy, until recently, has caused the world to become a better place; reducing poverty, climate related deaths, increasing lifespans, and damage from weather anomalies i.e.; not “climate change”!

Ottawa is a Great Example of Municipal Idiocy

With municipal elections just around the corner, Ottawa’s Mayoralty Candidates are having “eco-debates”!  The candidates include Bob Chiarelli a former mayor of Ottawa and when he was Ontario Minister of Energy is famous for suggesting the $1 billion cost associated with moving the planned Oakville gas plant was the cost of a Tim Horton’s coffee. It should come as no surprise the debates relate to the city councils approved; “Energy Evolution”, an 86 page document forecast to cost $57.4 billion and will reputedly transition Ottawa to a “net-zero” city by 2050. With a population of about 1.1 million that represents a cost per resident of about $52K or more than $200K for a family of four. An earlier article about Ottawa’s plan to get to “net-zero by 2050” strongly suggests it was written by Pollution Probe a group dedicated to convincing us all to abandon our use of fossil fuels to achieve the COP-26 targets. As if to exacerbate the push to spend those billions of dollars the City of Ottawa contracted Innovative Research Group to conduct a survey* that seems destined to produce favourable results for the Ottawa politicians due to the skewing of the questions. Perhaps Pollution Probe also had a hand in generating those survey questions?  It would be great if those municipal politicians running for mayor or council took the time to look at what has happened in the UK or Germany where energy prices have skyrocketed due to their push to “green” the electricity sector. This winter they plan to control the temperature households set to heat their homes! It seems apparent research isn’t something those seeking reelection or election to the City of Ottawa have bothered to do!

Province of Ontario Demonstrates Provincial Idiocy

From all appearances it seems almost conclusive the Premier Ford led government is simply carrying on with what Ontario experienced under the McGuinty/Wynne led government which brought us an almost tripling of the cost of electricity in the province.  While Ford did cancel the GEA (Green Energy Act), it is obvious they are still committed to eliminating fossil fuels completely which affects reliability and will surely drive-up generation costs. 

Beyond the announcement OPG would be adding a 300MW SMR (small modular reactor) which may be in service in 2028 at the Darlington site we have seen nothing from the current Ontario government aimed at ensuring we have a reliable supply of electricity in the future!  With the approximately 3,000 MW of the Pickering Nuclear plant scheduled to close by 2025 the Ford government (via his Minister of Energy, Todd Smith) is pushing the “Pathways to Decarbonization (P2D)” which fearfully, doesn’t seem to project reliability. The latter is concerning, as via a recent directive Minister Smith “asked IESO to evaluate a moratorium on the procurement of new natural gas-fired generating stations in Ontario and to develop an achievable pathway to phase out natural gas generation and achieve zero emissions in the electricity system.”  From all appearances the directive has led to the upcoming (September 19, 2022), Ontario Energy Conference “Navigating to Net Zero” classified as “Ontario’s Energy Transition”!  According to the page describing the conference a key issue is; “Energy customers are demanding clean energy solutions with some urgency” but doesn’t disclose who those “energy customers” are. My (personal) guess would be they are not small/medium sized businesses or households suffering from inflation but may include eco-warrior charities like Environmental Defence, David Suzuki Foundation, etc. etc.  In reality, it appears to be simply Ontario’s politicians complying with the wishes of Prime Minister Trudeau and his Minister of the Environment and Climate Change, Steven Guilbeault; famous for his actions when he was an eco-warrior climbing on the roof of former Alberta Premier, Ralph Klein’s home and scaring his wife as well as his criminal action of climbing the CN Tower!

It is worth noting that IESO had previously been asked by Minister Smith to evaluate the phaseout of natural gas and their report indicated the cost to eliminate it by 2030 would be $27 billion and raise electricity prices by 60%.  Interestingly on the page with the link to the foregoing report IESO note; “Did you know that natural gas provides just 7% of Ontario’s electricity needs, but on the hottest summer days can provide up to 30%?”  This was a clear message from IESO that without natural gas, Ontario would have to increase its generation considerably to ensure reliability and prevent blackouts.

A clear message about vulnerability totally ignored by Minister Smith and the Ford Government!

Only a Few of Many Examples of Federal Idiocy

Looking back to August 19, 2021 and viewing a video of Trudeau announcing one of his handouts before the upcoming election is an interesting exercise! At the press conference in BC he promised to provide funding “to support the training of 1,000 new community-based firefighters and the purchasing of new equipment to continue to fight the impacts of climate change across the country”. A question presented to him asked about inflation and the Bank of Canada possibly loosening inflation controls and his response was: “You’ll forgive me if I don’t think about monetary policy”!  We should also suspect his Minister of Finance and Deputy PM, Chrystia Freeland, is of a like mind so, spending our tax dollars on the “net-zero” pledge requires no thoughts about the consequences on Canada’s future despite the federal deficit having reached $314 billion in the year that had just ended on March 31, 2021.

German Chancellor Olaf Scholz recently visited Canada with the presumed hope Canada might be able to supply some natural gas via LNG shipments but all he got was a promise that maybe, sometime in the future, we might be able to supply Germany with “green hydrogen” generated by IWT (industrial wind turbines) out of Newfoundland. An article out of Germany however about the latter titled“Will rescue come from Canada?”casts serious doubt on that possibility as the following from the article notes (from the Google translation):  “So does this prove the feasibility of LH2 imports from Canada? The technical possibility may be given. However, the profitability is more than questionable. If you look at the whole supply chain: wind energy – electricity – electrolysis – liquefaction – ship transport – distribution – storage – generation in fuel cells – feeding into the grid – then you have to be very skeptical. It would be maddeningly expensive. Maybe then the LH 2 tax will be introduced in Germany and the kilowatt hour will ultimately cost one euro.” This was the best PM Trudeau could offer as the Liberals have stifled the generation of fossil fuels and the pipeline that would have brought them to export terminals.

The Trudeau led government during their reign in Canada have continued their efforts to achieve “net-zero” crippling our natural resource sector, advocating for EV to replace ICE vehicles by subsidizing their purchase and increasing the carbon tax on gasoline and diesel fuels. He and his minions such as Steven Guilbeault, Minister of the Environment and Climate Change and Jonathan Wilkinson, Minister of Natural Resources, despite having some of the largest reserves of natural gas in the world, have refused to allow the building of the infrastructure needed to export our oil and gas resources!

The “Build(ing) Back Better” advocacy pushed by the WEF (World Economic Forum) has become the recent version of the former communist “Five Year Plans” by the Liberal Government and enshrined in past budgets of the Trudeau government. It appears they haven’t realized Russia abandoned those Five Year Plans many years ago!  Canadians are now experiencing the results of those plans with inflation climbing, record Federal Debt, taxes rising and investment fleeing the country despite Canada’s abundance of resources.  It sure appears “Building Back Better”, by eliminating Canada’s exploitation of our natural resources is cripplingly us and harming those citizen’s who are not members of the elite’s of the Canadian Liberal Party.    

We should all find it fascinating a couple of months ago PM Trudeau was in Nova Scotia for a staged presence once again handing out $255 million of our tax dollars with $125 million destined for wind projects and $130 million for battery storage.  While making the announcement he was standing in a farmer’s field and in the background were several wind turbines that were totally dormant. We should doubt Trudeau actually noticed how those IWT demonstrated their intermittency and unreliability!  

The foregoing event occurred shortly after Trudeau displayed his new haircut patterned after Jim Carrey when Carrey stared in the movie series, Dumb & Dumber.  Now isn’t that ironic in how his new haircut and those dormant wind turbines enunciate how incredibly incompetent our current crop of elected leaders appear!

The time has come for politicians to take off the blinkers and do basic research before accepting what the eco-warriors incorrectly see as the end of the world unless we achieve “net-zero” emissions.

*Full disclosure:  I completed the survey twice using my e-mail address without pushback so eco-warriors from Pollution Probe or others may well have completed it dozens of times.

IWT: Well, they “Did it again” and again

Those IWT (industrial wind turbines) once again, on August 13, 2022, repeated their shortcomings of generating reliable electricity which they previously demonstrated by their failed performance on August 12, 2022 and a few other occasions so far this month.   

The approximately 4,900 MW of IWT grid-connected capacity once again fell flat in doing what reliable generation is supposed to do. Those IWT ignored Ontario demand which for the day (24 hours) totaled just over 311,000 MWh. The IWT delivered 2,361 MWh over the 24 hours representing 0.64% of total demand at an hourly average of 98 MWh or about 2% of their capacity.

Those IWT peaked at Hour 1 (hour ending at 1 AM) when they produced 289 MWh and their low point was hour 9, when daily demand was climbing.  At hour 9 they managed to generate 8 MWh (0.16% of their capacity) or about 3 kWh per IWT. One should surmise at that hour and at Hour 10 when they cranked out a miserly 11 MWh they were consuming much more power than they were generating!

The daily Ontario peak demand on August 13^th occurred at Hour 18 (hour ending at 6 PM) at 17,352 MW and those IWT contributed 89 MWh or 0.51% of peak demand and 1.8% of their capacity. Thankfully at the same hour Ontario’s natural gas plants ramped up to cover the shortfall generating 2,311 MWh or 13.3% of that hour’s demand.

One should wonder why in the world did our politicians (the McGuinty/Wynne days with Gerald Butts directing traffic) commit us Ontarians to provide IWT companies with first-to-grid rights? 

When anyone buys an expensive appliance or piece of equipment, they would never be impressed with a warranty suggesting; “may frequently perform at levels of less than 2%” but for some reason our elected politicians did and so far, the current Ford led government seems content to allow the charade to continue.

Time to let the politicians know IWT don’t deserve their contracts and they should pass a law demoting their stature by revoking their “first-to-the-grid-rights”. It is obvious to anyone examining the electricity sector in Ontario, IWT frequently generate unneeded power during the Spring and Fall seasons for which they are paid to often curtail generation (an expense for ratepayers) whereas, as pointed out above and in other recent posts, they often fail to generate power during our high demand periods occurring in the Summer and Winter seasons!

NB: Peaking at August 14, 2022 IWT generation suggests it looks to be more of the same!